The Scarlet Letter Scandal

by Mary T. McCarthy

  Maybe if the whole “camper” discussion hadn’t escalated into a visit from the motherfucking rent-a-cops, we could have discussed the painkiller deals going down at our playground. Those of us who wanted a locked gate put around that place are trying not to say “I told you so,” but the prescription medication epidemic in our “community” is something that’s only getting worse. We talk about our damn kids using drugs when half of us are popping pills faster than a grunge kid at a Nirvana concert in the 90s. Shit, I bet those 90s kids didn’t even do half of this shit.

  Another thing we didn’t even get to touch last night was the squirrel issue. Look, we can’t have people hosting “squirrel stew” parties while sitting around drinking in their yard firing off Red Ryder BB guns. I know the damn things are a problem nesting in the fiberglass insulation inside our piece of shit vinyl sided cardboard houses around here, but we have to try to humanely trap and release them outside the neighborhood, not string up collections of them from trees. (I’ve talked to Jason directly about this).

  My wife says our neighbor asked that I address the alleged swinger’s club (did someone say panty cam?) issue in this memo, but Jesus Christ, this thing is going to start turning into a fucking novel. I know some people feel that if a homeowner wants to host theme parties in the privacy of her own home, that’s obviously up to her (and I don’t think that’s the only motherfucking stripper pole in a neighborhood garage around here, for Chrissakes). Really nothing a homeowners association can be expected to handle—what the fuck are we, her mother? Nothing in the bylaws of this subdivision prohibits sex as far as I’m aware.

  Anyhow, I’m writing to make a proposal. I think we need to end this thing. Everyone hates homeowners associations, half the neighborhood is vacant, and nobody gives a shit anymore about paint colors and hedge heights. Fuck it. We either don’t have a quorum to vote, people are too drunk to vote, or there’s nothing to vote on, so unless someone has a better idea or wants to take on this “leadership” position I inherited when Bill Dickinson moved back in with his parents, I’m respectfully resigning. It’s just time to be sick of the bullshit.

  Sincerely,

  Chaz Appleton

  Jeannie’s mouth hung slightly agape. It was as if the letter had been written by a stranger. Her husband had never used language like that around her or the children, thank God. Why was he so cavalier about the sex club? Why would he resign when he hadn’t even spoken to her? Or maybe that was why the letter was in the trash—it hadn’t been sent. Jeannie had had no idea about the fight, or about any of the things in this memo. Drinking at meetings? She felt like she didn’t even know her husband—like he must have one face he showed to their family and another when he was out with his apparent drinking buddies. She knew they played poker once a month but never would have imagined all this insanity. Her cheeks flushed with humiliation, she ripped up the letter and threw it away, disgusted. She wasn’t even sure how she was going to begin talking to Chaz about it. She opened the filing cabinet drawer, got the file she needed, and just as she turned off the office light, something caught her eye through the gauze curtains of the office window.

  In the glare of a streetlight she could see a woman dressed in a costume hurrying down the sidewalk. She was wearing a pink cape. And were those feathers on her head? She could see there was nothing on her legs, and only a glimpse of shiny material of—could that be some kind of negligee? And very high hot pink heels? She was horrified. It certainly wasn’t Halloween and even if it was, this woman was dressed like a stripper and certainly had no place in this neighborhood right in view of her children’s windows.

  She called Chaz. He wasn’t home from work yet, in fact had texted her earlier in the evening saying he had late client meetings and wouldn’t be home until late. His voicemail immediately picked up.

  She had to find out what was going on. Hesitating for a moment—she had never left her kids home alone in the house—certainly her eight-year-old wasn’t old enough to babysit her six-year-old—she grabbed her purse, went into the garage, and reluctantly got into her car. She would just drive through the neighborhood for a moment, to see where this trashy woman was headed. Could it be the sex club? Jeannie’s heartbeat quickened.

  She didn’t want the woman to see Jeannie following her, so she turned the opposite way, knowing she could cut through another street to double back, making a circle through the neighborhood. She knew it was risky to end up driving toward her; she didn’t want to be seen, but Jeannie wanted to see which house she was heading to. Where else would she be going besides the famous swingers’ club? If so, she’d love nothing more than to lower her windows and discover the house was violating the noise ordinance. She had finally figured out her smart phone was useful the day she had been able to get an app that measured decibel levels. She called animal control on dogs that violated it at least once a week.

  She turned right, and then right again at the second corner, Maple Lane. The next right turn would mean she was heading back toward her own house. And then, from between two houses, in the glow of one of the houses’ exterior lights, she saw just a flash of pink. The woman was obviously headed to a backyard, though it wasn’t pool season—and at ten o’clock at night! She disappeared around the back of the house just as Jeannie glanced to her right and noticed the address lit up on the landscaping rocks: 205 Maple Lane. Kellie’s house. The landscaping rocks.

  Well, that just couldn’t be, Jeannie thought. There was no way the thirty-two-year-old welcoming club committee member and fitness instructor would be involved in some kind of sex club in her own house. She’d denied knowledge of it at Jeannie’s own house! Maybe this woman had been cutting through the backyard to another house. Jeannie couldn’t see into Kellie’s first floor rooms, and there weren’t any cars parked around the house. She lowered her window and didn’t hear a sound. Glancing at the time on her car dashboard, she figured she’d just make a quick run around the block again to see if anything else looked unusual. The neighborhood seemed awfully quiet for some crazy party to be going on.

  She made the turns again, slowly, looking out for any other costumed people walking the streets. Her heart was pounding in her chest. Already upset about the homeowners association memo, she found this discovery of the scantily clad woman to be especially jarring. She wished Chaz would return her call. She had already decided not to mention the memo. She didn’t want to upset him if it had never been sent, and was afraid he’d be angry with her for violating the privacy of his office. She hadn’t known him to ever lie to her before.

  She made the right onto Maple Lane, and everything again seemed quiet. She passed Kellie’s house, where once again she could see nothing unusual from the front. And then, just before she turned right onto her own street to head home, she noticed movement in her driver’s side rearview mirror: she briefly saw a man wearing a Phantom of the Opera mask and cape for only a moment before he disappeared from view. When she drove around again, a bit more quickly this time, she noticed her husband’s car parked in Hank’s driveway on Magnolia Court, a small cul-de-sac between Kellie’s house and her own. Hank’s house appeared dark and there was no sign of her husband—she wondered why Chaz wouldn’t have mentioned stopping there on his way home.

  Jim Swain got out of his car and rushed toward the back yard. He grabbed the Nordstrom bag containing the new Louboutins he’d bought in DC. Lisa had messaged about delivering and setting up a wedding cake, so he knew he didn’t have much time. He needed to grab his costume and get the car out of there. If she pulled in and saw he’d arrived home, there would be no stopping by Rocks Swingers’ Club that evening for the masquerade party, and he could only rarely go there on nights when “single” men were allowed. He’d been looking forward to going for months and cursed himself for not putting the costume in his car earlier.

  Being with Kristinah had changed Jim. He had vowed to be faithful to Lisa and his potential family, yet felt like a failure. They lost the baby, and the therapy
he’d gone to had been a joke. You can’t change people, he thought. Or at least, not me.

  Kristinah had been everything he dreamed about. He thought back to their night together, to how he was free to indulge his fantasies for an entire evening. He’d bought her this new pair of shoes and couldn’t wait to see her again, though he was limiting his excursions to once a month so Lisa wouldn’t be suspicious.

  His phone lit up.

  Lisa: On my way home. Are you there yet?

  Jim: Not yet. Have another hour at the office. Don’t wait up.

  He had to get out of there. He wanted to get to that party. He fumbled with his key ring for the exterior key to the cellar stairs. Terrified of spiders, Lisa absolutely hated the basement storage area and refused to go down there, so it was here where he kept his secrets from her. He even used the exterior (versus the always-locked interior) door to come and go from the space, and only when she wasn’t home. It was like a physical separation from his “normal” life to his much less accepted “alternative” one. He hurried through the side yard. Exterior lights wouldn’t be turned on until he went inside, and he didn’t want to turn on his flashlight app and have anyone see him.

  He needed to get those shoes put away and grab that bag from the costume store he’d stashed downstairs a few weeks ago. He cursed himself again for not retrieving it sooner as he rounded the side of the house to the back.

  His phone lit up again as he rounded the corner to head down the steep flight of concrete steps. He put the shoe bag in his other hand to try to check the message, and, in the dark, he did not see or remember the garden hose stretched across the top of the stairs running to the flowerbeds under the kitchen window. He had a second to think his last thought—Lisa left that out after watering the fall mums, goddammit—and then he was falling. It happened too quickly and on a moonless night, and he tumbled head over heels, until the falling stopped abruptly on the hard concrete at the bottom of the steps. His neck had twisted and broken when he landed. He lay there, a text message picture of Kristinah’s feet displayed on the cracked screen of his phone, a plastic Nordstrom bag fluttering in the fall breeze, and a brand new pair of blood red Christian Louboutin shoes and their open box strewn around him.

  When Lisa pulled her car into the driveway, she was surprised to see Jim’s car there, since he’d told her he would not be home. Maybe he’s going to surprise me, she thought, though he sometimes parked inside the garage. She saw his passenger’s side door was open and thought that odd, too. And then she noticed that the house was completely dark. What was going on? She looked around, thinking maybe he had seen a neighbor, though it wasn’t like him to stop and talk.

  She walked to the front door and it was locked. Now this was odd. The trashcans were still on the curb; the garage was closed. Where could he have gone? She walked back to her car and got back in, leaving the door open. She figured Jim would show up any moment, having run into a neighbor to talk about—what? They never talked to the neighbors, really. She didn’t even know her next-door neighbors well enough to go to their door.

  She got out of the car and locked it, walking over to Jim’s car. The keys were dangling from the ignition. She couldn’t imagine how, since he’d told her he would not be home and not to wait up, he’d be in the house, but it was the only logical place. Maybe he’d had to go to the bathroom or something and just not returned to the—but his keys were in the car and the house was locked…

  She’d check anyway. She opened the house with her own keys and the mail was on the foyer floor. He hadn’t been in here yet. He would have turned the lights on. And then she started to feel a sense of dread.

  She walked back to Jim’s car, seeing his wallet in the center console. He had to be right nearby.

  “Jim?” she called. She didn’t want to yell and disturb the neighbors but she wanted him to hear her.

  She started walking around the side of the house to the backyard, though she couldn’t imagine what he’d be doing back there in the pitch black. The sidewalk light illuminated their driveway, but out back it was very dark.

  She took her phone out of her purse and touched the “Jim” contact. And she heard the familiar ringtone, the one she’d hear when he couldn’t find his phone in the house and asked her to call it. The electronic tone sounded muffled, somehow distant, but close. As she turned the corner from the side of the house to the backyard, she saw the faint light. It took her mind a moment to even remember the cellar steps. She never used them. What on earth would he be doing down there at this time of night?

  “Jim?” she called again.

  It was too dark to see where she was going, so she double-clicked the home button on her iPhone, keeping the phone call alive but opening her flashlight app. She moved toward the cellar steps, expecting him to walk up the stairs at any moment. The closer she got to the steps, the brighter the light from his phone got until suddenly it was dark again. She looked at her phone and the call had ended.

  She figured he was inside the basement for some reason and hadn’t heard her. Her flashlight app illuminated the curled green garden hose. She cursed herself for forgetting to wind it up on its reel, picked it up and tossed it aside so she wouldn’t…then suddenly she saw a white plastic bag puffing up in the breezy fall gusts. It fluttered up a few steps, back down…she traced it with her flashlight when to her shock the beam illuminated her husband. He lay on his back, his legs twisted under him oddly, his head bent at a horribly unnatural angle.

  Lisa screamed at the top of her lungs, an agonizing wail that echoed in all the corners of her brain and across their 0.601 acres of land and beyond. A dog from three houses away barked from inside the house, but she didn’t hear it as she ran down the steps. She knew, even the first moment she saw him, that he was dead. His eyes were open. Blood had trickled down the side of his mouth and she saw that it was red. Still red, so it just happened.

  Lisa felt herself spinning, like she would throw up or faint. But the thought of passing out on her husband’s corpse was enough to bring her brain back to a steadier place. She felt for a pulse, knowing there wouldn’t be one. She propped her phone on the step to provide light, and then she saw the open shoebox and the four-inch red leather spike heels. She recognized the Louboutin box, though it had been so many months since she’d seen shoes like that.

  She picked up her phone, moved up a few steps, sat down, in shock at the realization. She began to bawl, at first nonsensically for the baby who would never have a father, even though that baby hadn’t lived. She cried out of guilt for the loneliness she had felt in her marriage, what she could have done better, and for the shame he must have felt about the shoes, that he had to hide them from her. She wondered if she unlocked the basement door right now, if she’d see stacks and stacks of them. She couldn’t face that. And then she was suddenly angry: if he hadn’t come down here to hide the shoes in the first place, he wouldn’t have… and then she wailed again, remembering the garden hose. It was her fault. I killed my husband. However unintentionally, Lisa thought, I am at fault.

  She was sure she would go to jail. She shook and trembled and cried, more quietly now. Had the neighbors heard her? Should she run and get one of them? Call 911? He was already dead. Her thoughts flew, and she had the odd thought that she should feel more sad right now. Why wasn’t she more upset?

  Lisa hesitated for a few moments and then decided to call Maggie. She really couldn’t think of anyone else to call—she didn’t have any friends in the neighborhood and she was terrified to call 911, of the police and the questions. Wouldn’t they arrest her?

  “Hey there, baker,” Maggie answered. “What are you doin’ calling this la—?”

  She stopped talking when she heard Lisa’s sobs. “What’s the matter, hon?” Maggie asked with concern.

  “I need you to come to my house,” Lisa sputtered out. “My husband is dead and they are going to think I killed him.”

  “Don’t move a muscle,” said Maggie. “I will be
right there. Don’t touch anything or move anything, and get away from where he is. Sit tight. I will see you in five minutes.”

  She hung up, and Lisa put down her phone and breathed. Maggie would somehow make everything okay, though it would obviously never be okay again. She shivered in the fall breeze, pulling her arms tightly around her thin frame. She wanted to go inside, she didn’t want to move. She didn’t want to look, but she couldn’t look away. She put her head down on her knees.

  Jim’s cracked phone screen lit up again, a ping noise jolting her out of her frozen state. NEW MESSAGE FROM K appeared on the front screen, with the “slide to unlock” option. She instinctively slid, and the password screen came up. She thought for a second. His birthday? No. Her birthday? No. Their wedding anniversary? 0-4-0-7. And suddenly she was looking a text message with a photo. A photo of a woman’s foot dangling seductively out of a single dark blue spike heel and the words: Ready for another foot job soon?

  She smashed the phone onto the concrete as hard as she could. She didn’t care that she wasn’t supposed to touch anything—the wrecked phone would look like it happened in the fall. She didn’t care anymore. She shakily ascended the cellar stairs, tossing the garden hose out of the way, walked into the house, then into the kitchen, opened a bottle of wine, and sat at her kitchen counter barstool, waiting for Maggie to get there.

  When Maggie came through the door, Lisa was on her second glass of wine and looked a mess. Maggie ran over and hugged her.